Species-Specific Management (SSM)
Cuckoos
The yellow-billed cuckoo (Coccyzus americanus) and the black-billed cuckoo (Coccyzus erythropthalmus) are quite similar with respect to their life histories and food and habitat preferences. They differ slightly in their ranges. The black-billed cuckoo can be found in Southern Canada and in the United States east of the Rocky Mountains. The yellow-billed cuckoo can be found in temperate North America, the Caribbean region, and South and Central America. There is some overlap of ranges in the northern United States and in the western parts of Virginia and North Carolina and western Kentucky and Tennessee. The western yellow-billed cuckoo may be endangered.
Faunal Space
Originally these species were probably woodland birds, but they now frequent those areas occupied by people, where they are not often bothered and where food is abundant. They are found in woodland edges, in thickets, where the tree growth is not too heavy, and within brush-grown lanes, dense thickets along streams, and in apple orchards. They are poor nest builders and nest generally from 4 to 8 feet off the ground. These low nests (made of twigs, lined with moss and grass, 5-6 inches in diameter, 1-2 inches deep, preferably in oak, beech, dogwood, hawthorn, pine, apple and other orchard trees) are vulnerable to predation from cowbirds, feral cats, and other mammals. Their sounds are very much a part of the springtime of the southern Appalachian forests.
Management Tactics
- Maintain hedgerows along streams and fencerows.
- Discourage grazing and burning practices which will eliminate brushy habitats.
- Remove trees larger than sapling size to prevent reductions in food production as a result of too much shade.
- Provide small trees, such as, hawthorns, dogwood, apple, crab apple, black cherry, shrubs and thickets for nesting sites. These trees are hosts for tent caterpillars.
- Provide food sources that produce soft mast. Some that you may want to plant are: grapes, raspberries, blueberries, mulberries, and elderberries. Some of the plants may also provide cover for the cuckoo nests.
- Locate protected or arranged nesting sites close to food sites. In many cases, nesting cover and food may be obtained from the same plants.
- Create brush piles.
- Plant apple tree clumps.
- Plant crops that are susceptible to insects, such as, wheat and barley. This provides an alternative source of food.
- Avoid using pesticides. Cuckoos may be capable of destroying entire local insect populations on their own.
- Key food groups: locusts, army worms, ants, wasps, flies, and dragon flies.
- Avoid, also, the use of insecticides because they may destroy the cuckoo's food supply. Cuckoos are among some of the most useful birds, especially to the farmer, because caterpillars make up the principal food of cuckoos during their seasons of abundance. Other insects and wild fruits complete the cuckoo's diet.
- Maintain water quality; prevent sedimentation; prevent toxicants and pollution; prevent eutrophication; maintain waterflow.
Feedback
Feedback about the relative success of a management plan can be obtained from recorded observations. These records allow the manager to note changes that have taken place since initiating a management plan. Effective work will achieve changes in the population and its use in the desired objectives. For example, if increased numbers of cuckoo populations are the objective and the numbers of cuckoo observations have increased, it can be concluded that the management plan is successful. With no progress towards the desired objective, adjustments in the objectives, or practices may be needed.
These birds winter in Venezuela and Columbia. Management work and encouragement is needed there, throughout the migration route, as well as on the summer range.
A contribution of Marion E. Mason (1992)and
Beth Naylor (1996),
Department of Fisheries and Wildlife Sciences,
Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University,
Blacksburg, Virginia 24061-0321
Submitted by Robert H. Giles, Jr.
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Last revision March 31, 2000.